Team:Aachen/InteractiveTour10

The Search for an Alternative Carbon Source


Creating our future

Some parts of the world have been living beyond their means, creating carbon debt and living on it. As we know from economics and crisis management, living beyond our means is not sustainable behaviour.

Jean-Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission


To leave our children a clean and stable world, we have to act now! Two major problems, hunger and climate change are the most pressing challenges of our time. To solve them, all current solutions are based on biomass. Biomass produced from the most ineffective factories on the planet: plants. Therefore, we already deforested 130 million ha of forest within the last 20 years, getting only 47.5 million ha of agricultural area. With the growing population and the need for a substitute for oil, we have to find new ways.


Based on high efficient technical CO2 conversion methods, we developed a new process to convert the produced methanol into a universal carbon source, glycogen. This sustainable carbohydrate is able to be used in biotechnological processes, as well as in main parts of the starch industry.


By accomplishing this new manufacturing process, we can regain arable land for food production, instead of energy crop cultivation and provide a reliable source of sustainable carbohydrates.